Long Stirrings Poems

Juvenilia: Early Poems V

Poetry
by Michael R. Burch

Poetry, I found you
where at last they chained and bound you;
with devices all around you
to torture and confound you,
I found you—shivering, bare.

They had shorn your raven hair
and taken both...

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Poems about Poems III

Radiance
by Michael R. Burch

for Dylan Thomas

The poet delves earth’s detritus?hard toil?
for raw-edged nouns, barbed verbs, vowels’ lush bouquet;
each syllable his pen excretes?dense soil,
dark images impacted, rooted clay.

The poet sees the sea but...

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I once spent a week in the drunk tank
couldn't handle the spirits that I drank
the cuisine wasn't half bad
we even had a few laughs
but I had to guard my butt with a shank


……………………………………………………………………….


It used to...

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1) Preamble

As breath’s created, sustained and destroyed,
we see trika, threefold aspect at play
through life, where we are by ego decoyed,
until we choose to make love our mainstay.
Beyond religions, scriptures and folklore,
let’s explore the direct path...

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China Tour Diary Moment #1
--------------------------------

KUNMING THOUGHTS


Sunday morning flight to Kunming city;
East bound to explore vignettes of China;
New vistas to sight, postcard memories;
Feast visual galore on tour agenda.

Yunnan province greets our earthly landing;
Brisk clearance and we...

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China Tour Diary Moment #3
SHANGRI-LA, TIBET
--------------------------------


Paradise on earth: Himalayan range;
A phenomenon carved by elements;
Here magic gives birth to ways that seem strange;
A place where lessons of soul mark movement.


Our tour coach winds round the mountain...

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Sonnets V-IX



Afterglow
by Michael R. Burch

The night is full of stars. Which still exist?
Before time ends, perhaps one day we’ll know.
For now I hold your fingers to my lips
and feel their pulse... warm, palpable and slow...

once...

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Young like the Spring grass, smelling
Beautiful – so fresh and alive,
Trembling dandelions dancing in the light
Sunny whims caressing the thoughts,
Remembering the joy and kindness
She brought when she gentled the dreams,
With laughing honesty, sincerity
Wishing on the...

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I take my pen, hesitant to write
poetries, moments so tender, alive
like the music that choruses 
through my spirit, in inklings of light
breathless verses, visions
coloring pages with what survives
my last 60 years, 
the days when I...

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Psalms 19 (KJV)

9 The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.

10 More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine...

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It was here,
On the heart of Appalachia
Where the moon and stars shimmer
Across the blue gray ridges,
Where the sunlight reflects the whisper
Echoing through the pines and laurels
Struggling to be heard through the stillness
Darkening the whimsical thoughts
Quieting...

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this barren page, screaming, crying
	yelling through the winds,
		inviting me to begin again,
always, to just begin
	again and again, tempting my pen
tempting me to just begin, begin
	A G A I N

this infertile soil, empty page – white...

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trees tremble, quietly
	in the laughter of sweet winds
		leaves rustling, waltzing, twisting
			through the fresh noon gentleness
abiding in my spirit, the stirrings 
of a hesitant dream…

predictions of glowing silence in the moonlight
whimsical stars, breaking through the heat
of...

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My love, let us live this paradisal evening
dressed in wispy clouds of red
and tailored in strips of orange embellishing the horizon
where shades and shadows embrace your face
as the last glimmer of daylight falls
leaving a raptured...

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In flames, feelings bruised my spirit,
Maze of ethereal lights,
Delicate as the dew who whispers soundless poetry,
Pouring out gentle into the moments,
Soundless adventures, dancing
In rhythms, singing through the edges of a shadow,
Trembling on transparent truths,
Authenticity rising...

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My love, let us live this paradisal evening
dressed in wispy clouds of red
and tailored in strips of orange embellishing the horizon
where shades and shadows embrace your face
as the last glimmer of daylight falls
leaving a raptured...

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"discarding narrow thought flow crutch
we learn directly by soft touch
and what we garner we relay
to the vast void in childlike play
entwined thus with the universe
we dance without need to rehearse"
~ line of inquiry by Unseeking...

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There is the presence of grace, the presence of faith, the presence of God,
In the flowers, the rain, the beauty, the pain, all over the night…
Where light doesn’t fade, because His love made a way...

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Gentle leaves, breathing soft prayers,
	Praising the One who silences the seas,
		Sends peace through the flow of winds,

Gentle leaves, in hues of hopeful, delicate
	Gold, mahogany, tangerine – crisp beauties,
		Stories beneath the laughing gatherings,

Gentle leaves, pouring out...

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"Autumn leaves don't fall, they fly. They take their time and wander on this their only chance to soar." - Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing

I’ll loose myself in an autumn stroll
When leaves dance in...

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The meadows clearing....

Surrounded by the forest, afore the mountains sculpted by time

Majestic splendors, rising, beneath the blueish skies

With cascading waters, of virgins white melting snow

Heavens unveilings, before all of our eyes

These gifts unto the living,...

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Between Earth and Ecstasy
My soul, wrought from the dust of falling stars,
Has embraced the undisturbed illusions, resting not in halted slumber,
They levitate, and like the crescent moon blooming, dark stirrings grow within me,
I rend the...

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POEMS ABOUT SCIENCE: COMPUTERS

The AI Poets
by Michael R. Burch

The computer-poets stand hushed
except for the faint hum
of their efficient fans,
waiting for inspiration.

It is years now
since they were first ground
out of refurbished silicon
into rack-mounted encoders of sound.

They...

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IV.
It started out like it had every year,
she went to the hospital, sat on a bench,
stared at the eminence from the outside,
and felt the stirrings of a heart to be wrenched,
just about the time that...

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(I have two sons- late arrivals after long years of waiting. My elder son left home for his studies relatively at a young age. My younger son was with us until he left for his...

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